Xun Hui Man
Xun Hui Man (勋慧文) is a Cabinan notable publicly known as a self-made freeman, philanthropist, and a pillar of the local Hong Luan community in the planetary capital of Lux Gravare and the Benilli system at large. Not so publicly, he is a ruthless crime boss, formerly aligned with the 14 Red Dogs Triad, and with that organization’s official dissolution he is now attempting to play both House Triangulum and SERAPH as he maintains and expands his criminal operations for no one’s benefit except his own. As part of his charitable front, he runs the Red Lotus Society, which is a stakeholding entity in SERAPH. Biography Xun Hui’s parents were serfs in the employ of House Cygnus. In the first half of the 32nd century, House Cygnus was part of a project to expand asteroid mining in the Benilli system’s Canillo Belt via synthetic labor. The Man family was one of dozens of serf families moved from Hong Lu to Benilli by House Cygnus to serve as serf overseers, tasked with giving day-to-day human directions to the non-human labor force. Xun Hui was born on a command station somewhere in deep space. With the outbreak of the War Against the Artificials, the mining efforts collapsed. Cygnus nobles and synthetics alike either left for battleground systems to join the fight, or disappeared into the Vigil’s Railroad, and those not smart or able enough to properly do either found themselves in the hands of House Crux sooner or later. Xun Hui’s parents died in the chaos, and the young man found himself orphaned on the streets of Lux Gravare. With the start of the Hong Lu Revolt, returning to the planet of his parents’ birth wasn’t much of an option, even if he could make it there. Instead, Xun Hui found home and shelter with the numerous burgeoning Repentant initiatives to try and give peace, shelter, and work to the many refugees of war pouring in. He spent his formative years living in various shelters and doing odd jobs and seasonal work, both in the major cities and on the Cabina Frontier. What drives a man to a life of crime is always an impossible question. There is no shortage of extenuating circumstances to excuse Xun Hui’s behavior: he lost his parents at a young age, he saw his noble house and their greatest work slaughtered by the billions, he was left robbed not only of what little possessions his family had, but also of their future and place in the Empire. Yet, on the other hand, he also had no shortage of opportunities to lead a different life: Cabina was, by and large, a relatively safe place amidst the tumult of civil war. Its people overwhelmingly wanted to help, not persecute, the victims of the war, and they had sufficient resources to give young and enterprising people like Xun Hui another chance at life. But no matter the cause, Xun Hui would find himself leading a double life. To the public, he became known as a successful local businessman and beloved philanthropist, a model rags-to-riches story. When House Cygnus finally fell, he smoothly transitioned into a Repentant program to set former Cygnus serfs up with proper Repentant nobles who wouldn’t demand too much of them, if anything at all. Effectively gaining him freeman status. Yet simultaneously, away from prying eyes, he was ruthlessly rising through the ranks of the Cabinan criminal underworld. A key factor in his rise was his skillful use of his Hong Luan heritage to ingratiate himself to what he’d keenly judged was the new rising power in the sector’s underworld: the 14 Red Dogs Triad. By the time the Cygnus Emperox was assassinated, Xun Hui had long since staged his own assassination to open up a vacancy allowing him to become the Sin Fung of the Benilli system, the local boss charged with running the small Benilli portion of the Triad’s sector-wide criminal empire. With the dissolving of the 14 Red Dogs into House Triangulum, Xun Hui saw an opportunity to solidify his own position as independent from any major faction. Though he officially swore fealty to his new superiors in the House, at the same time he took full control over the Cabinan operations of the 14 Red Dogs Society charity. Reorganizing and rebranding it into an independent charity called the Red Lotus Society, Xun Hui used both his criminal connections and his public profile as a beloved Cabinan philanthropist to gain admission for his new charity into the newly formed SERAPH, the Red Lotus Society joining as a minor stakeholding entity. Paying dues and allegiances to both House Triangulum and SERAPH at the same time does not keep Xun Hui awake at night, since he was never in it for anyone other than himself to begin with. Activities Businessman As a businessman, Xun Hui Man runs a franchise of establishments known as “Hong Lu Houses”. He maintains about half a dozen of these in the planetary capital of Lux Gravare alone, with a full dozen more spread out across the other two Cabinan cities and the Cabinan Frontier. To the public eye, Hong Lu Houses are somewhat questionable places serving largely seedy crowds, but advertised as offering authentic Hong Luan cuisine and services: from tea to Cardinâlis risotto, from Wànnéng Wǔjutsu exhibitions to holographic concerts of the Nine Treasures. The seedy crowd is explained by the fact that Hong Lu Houses offer high quality services on the cheap, attracting clientele that can’t afford to get this level of luxury anywhere else. Crime Boss As a crime boss, Zun Hui uses the Hong Lu Houses as a front for all manner of illegal activities, from drugs to brothels to gambling. Their legit services are cheap, because their products are gained through extortion of a number of frontier communities firmly under Xun Hui’s sway. Amongst the worst and most dangerous businesses Xun Hui is involved in is the illicit cultivation of Shatter Zaffre to create the eponymous Shatter Drug. Part of the harvest is sold on the streets, and another part is shipped off-world, but the rest is served in the backrooms of certain Hong Lu Houses in the form of Shatter Tea. To the clientele, the houses say that mixing Shatter with Hong Lu-style tea lessens the dangers of Shatter use. This is a lie, there is no safe way to use Shatter. Shatter Tea is safer, but this is because there is greater control and precision as to the dose of active substance in each cup as compared to ingesting Shatter raw. With some regularity, things still go wrong, and for this purpose all Hong Lu Houses serving Shatter Tea are located at the Canomere riverside, for easy and anonymous disposal of the bodies of more unfortunate clientele. Philanthropist As a philanthropist, Xun Hui is known for providing opportunity to, in particular, the Hong Luan community on Cabina, but also to Benilli spacers, natives to the Cabinan Frontier, and generally anyone who dreams of mimicking his rags-to-riches story. Having taken control of the local operations of the charitable 14 Red Dogs Society branch, Xun Hui has turned it into his own private charity, the Red Lotus Society. Using both his criminal connections and his public profile as a beloved Cabinan philanthropist, Xun hui has gained admission for his new charity into the newly formed SERAPH, the Red Lotus Society joining as a minor stakeholding entity. The Red Lotus Society charity, runs a number of shelters, orphanages, cram schools, and exchange programs across the planet of Cabina. As there is no lack of such initiatives on the heavily Repentant planet, the society only serves a modest number of those in need, but enough to legitimately maintain a believable front to keep prying eyes away from Xun Hui’s less legitimate operations. In addition to helping maintain a good public image, the society’s programs are also used to help discover enterprising young talent that’s open to working in the dark underbelly of Cabinan society. In addition, Xun Hui is also a generous donor to numerous non-crime affiliated charities, such as the recently founded Gran Panacea Charitable Foundation or the Maajid Memorial Foundation for the Education of Humanity. Relationships With the Cabinan Public Xun Hui Man maintains a successful public image as a legit businessman and philanthropist, putting him in good standing with most of the lesser informed members of Cabinan low and high society. Amongst the more moral end of the societal spectrum, people dislike the seedy repute of his Hong Lu Houses, but praise the upstanding work he does for the community, both in running his own charitable activities and donating generously to those of others. With the Cabinan Elites To those more in the know of the dark underbelly of Cabina, Xun Hui Man is a deeply grey individual. A ruthless crime boss, most nevertheless realize that as long as the sector is as it is, there will be crime, and Xun Hui Man is neither the best nor the worst person to be in charge of it on Cabina. In general, Xun Hui Man is known to be helpful when it comes to covert Repentant projects such as the Vigil’s Railroad, and this usefulness buys him leeway a less useful criminal lord would not be granted on the planet. With Rival Cabinan Criminals and Gangs Within the actual criminal world of Cabina, Xun Hui Man has few challengers, but many rivals. The most prominent is the local branch of the Eridanii Tax Breachers, which operate from Cabina’s third largest city and industrial heartland, Gadalfo. Though largely at peace, the relationship between the rival mafia’s is tense, and every now and then still breaks into violence when hot-shot underlings forget to remember whose turf they’re operating on. Relations with the Angels gang are always tense, due to the Angels' fierce hatred of drug dealing and dealers. Violent clashes between the gang and triad members are a rare but regular occurrence, whenever members of either side intentionally or accidentally end up in the wrong neighborhood. With Cabinan Refugees and Frontier Folk Those with the most to fear from Xun Hui Man, are the poor serf, noble, and synthetic refugees who had the misfortune of having their cover blown to the crime boss. Whether it was because he helped smuggle them onto Cabina in the first place, or because he just happened to extract the information from somewhere, once Xun Hui Man knows why you cannot make a life for yourself on any other planet, he’ll make sure that the only life you can make for yourself on Cabina is one in service to him. His sway in certain parts of the Cabinan Frontier is in no small part thanks to this ruthless blackmail. Category:Cabina Category:Characters Category:NPCs Category:SERAPH Members Category:14 Red Dogs Triad Members Category:House Triangulum